M105 Water Tank Rack or HIPPO

[joseph stanze]

I am an engineering tech for the company who manufactures the M105 Water Tank Rack or better know as the HIPPO.

I am looking for suggestions for a faster heating solution for the enclosure of the Hippo. We are currently using blanket heaters on the belly of the tank and some heat tape for a small piece of plumbing in the dog house. just on here looking for suggestions from the field or from vets that are familiar with this piece of equipment. Thanks to all ahead of time!

 

[gimpyrobb]

An M105 or an M149?


So what are the square holes in the bed for?

Is your company hiring?

Just looked it up online, seems to be an attachment for a PLS.

 

[joseph stanze]

Its an m 105 usually called the hippo.. 2000 gal potable water tank

 

[joseph stanze]

No not hiring...

 

[3dAngus]

Pictures are always nice....

 

[gimpyrobb]

I was looking through the TM and it seems you have a motor to run the pump for transferring water. Why not use a genset to power an electric pump and then you could use an electric heating element threaded into a port on the tank.

 

[gimpyrobb]

Pic

 

[preyn2]

If you don't need the entire 2000 gallons to be hot, I wouldn't heat the tank. It would be tremendously energy intensive to get that thing heated up. Granted, once you got it heated, it would retain the heat for a good while, but you'd have to get the fuel or whatever energy source you decided to use to the forward area, thus compounding logistical problems.

I would determine the required volume (gallons per minute) and temperature and build or purchase an inline heater that would only burn fuel when hot water was required. A point-of-use water heater, only on a larger scale.

Look at liquid-fueled steam cleaners, with their diesel-fueled water heaters, as an example and scale it according to your requirements.

 

[preyn2]

Sorry...just re-read your problem. You aren't trying to heat the water, you're trying to heat the machinery, as in, to prevent freezing. Correct?

You could route exhaust gases through a heat exchanger to heat the enclosure.

You could install a "bullet" heater.

You could install a point-of-use heater and recirculate the water enough to prevent freezing.

Just what pops to mind. Hope it helps.

 

[joseph stanze]

Yes that is the goal.. To keep the plumbing warm enough to prevent freezing. Right now we are at 60 minutes prep time to pump water at-25 F . Our goal is to be at 30 minutes prep time to pump water. Great suggestions though, will investigate all options

 

[3dAngus]

Put in a 115vac electric control valve that turns on and opens up to the plumbing.
It should have parallel water piping with a engine block heater, 1500-2500 watts, run off 120vac such as a HOTstart engine block heater. It will heat and recirculate the water through the plumbing via heat rising, much the same as the hotstart engine block heater in the MVs today. No motors needed. Just a 120vac outlet via gen set or household current.

Hotstart Products - Engine Heaters for Industry, Locomotive, More

Or, just do what your engineers would do, if they are smart, and contact Hotstarts or Johnson controls, or any other heating engineering department for problem solution.
That's the way govt. engineers do it. It's called partnering.

No one is really going to solve that problem here without a great deal of luck, not having pictures, schematics, diagrams, specifications, weights, pipe sizing, capacity etc. etc. etc.

I still don't know if there is a requirement to warm anything in that huge tank or not, or warm the tank itself. What power will be available. What kind of voltage and current you're going to be authorized. Or is it going to be a fuel driven system by specification rather than electrical power. Insufficient information.

 

[emmado22]

I had what I was told was the first one of those in the US Army back in Ft hood in 1997/9ish timeframe.

 

[bikeman]

While not a permanent solution, why not see if you could slave or attach to a PLS? I wouldn't recommend a GenSet unless you were going to include it as part of the system as generators on hand are already allocated for something.

a solar heater may work too.... remember the Army is trying to be all green... (and that's not referring to the paint jobs!)

 

[gimpyrobb]

Yes that is the goal.. To keep the plumbing warm enough to prevent freezing. Right now we are at 60 minutes prep time to pump water at-25 F . Our goal is to be at 30 minutes prep time to pump water. Great suggestions though, will investigate all options

Just install one of the fuel fired heaters like on a truck or some gensets. They are like mini salamander heaters. Let me see if I can find a pic.

 

[gimpyrobb]

Here ya go, had a pic in my photo album. These put out 30,000 btu but the larger ones do 60. I have both if you need to see them.

http://www.steelsoldiers.com/members/gimpyrobb-albums-gimp-s-pics-picture1459-multifuel-heater.html

 

[joseph stanze]

correct @ gimpy rob.., Just got on to look for some suggestions from the actual end users of this equipment to get a better feel for what may be desired on a redesigned unit with improvements. There are almost 1200 Hippos in circulation between the Army, National Guard, Air force, and Marines. I'm sure there is some troops out there with some ideas. Thank you all!

 

[FireFighterHill]

What about an artic kit that includes a insulating blanket and DC and/or AC heater elements that can be added. Or the entire blanket could be used as a heating element. If you went the blanket route it should be fairly easy to install and field and safe for soldiers.

 

[joseph stanze]

I have designed 3 separate heater blankets for the 2 valves and pump. So far nothing but positive feed back from the group at CWTC in alaska. Just on here looking for improvement suggestions from the actual troops for redesign purposes. Thanks for all the input.

 

[joseph stanze]

They are self regulated dc heaters that plug directly into the NATO slave receptacle inside the Hippo.

 

[Ken_86gt]

How about insulation? If you prevent it from losing heat you won't have to heat it - not much in any case. keep it simple....and save money in the long run.